A sparkling revival of George Balanchine’s showpiece lets the Royal Ballet's
couples shine, says Mark Monahan

George Balanchine’s Jewels (1967) is a craftsmanlike homage to – in turn – the French Romantic tradition (Emeralds), the jazz and pizzazz of Broadway (Rubies) and the grandeur of the Mariinsky of the 1890s (Diamonds). It is also unquestionably a vivid and detailed response to the individual traits of the New York City Ballet stars for whom it was created.

However, whether it is also, as is often claimed, strictly speaking the first ever full-evening abstract ballet – as opposed to a triptych of similarly themed shorts – remains open to question. Even Balanchine himself later as good as debunked the suspiciously PR-friendly, headline-grabbing notion that it was somehow inspired by a visit to the jewellers Van Cleef & Arpels. And for that matter, is the whole package quite up there with Balanchine’s greatest work?

Still, as a bums-on-seats showpiece for a world-class company, it certainly has allure, even if the first night of the Royal Ballet’s current revival took a while to start sparkling. Emeralds (to Fauré), the most melancholic and implicitly mist-shrouded of the three, is in some ways the hardest to get right. It requires the lead ballerina especially to suggest a romantic backstory where there is none, to hint strongly at a kind of grave, nostalgic introspection. Roberta Marquez danced the steps capably but was otherwise a blank canvas. And, although surrounded by fine dancers – Edward Watson, a notably on-form Laura Morera, the increasingly commanding Ryoichi Hirano – the collective impression was of an ensemble only rarely stoked by the steps, the music or each other.

Not so in Rubies. As the lone amazonian, Zenaida Yanowsky, pro that she is, swiftly banished memories of an unfortunate early stumble backwards, delivering a mighty display of lofty, sexy, devil-may-care insolence. And there was an air of mutual and musical exhilaration about the central couple – Sarah Lamb and Steven McRae – that blazed into the stalls.

Lamb was never less than dynamic, particularly so in the middle section, rocketing her legs skywards and then weaving them through each other like steel serpents. McRae’s combination of rigorous articulation, formidable elevation and speed (those spins!) provided the perfect complement, and, as with Lamb, the Stravinsky seemed to fizz from his fingertips.

Diamonds, the Tchaikovsky-driven finale, saw an even stronger partnership in South American husband-and-wife duo Marianela Nuñez and Thiago Soares. His jetés may be no match for McRae’s, but his musicality and his timing are unimpeachable, as, here, was his partnering, especially in the pas de deux.

Clearly knowing she was in the safest possible hands, Nuñez invested every arabesque, attitude, balance and bend with a luxuriant regality that was also tinged with just the right dash of Odette-esque solemnity. And, if a 2009 rendering of the same part on the same stage by Alina Cojocaru (now with English National Ballet) remains the one to beat, Nuñez is now looking gloriously close.